Zimbabwe: DIEM – Data in Emergencies Monitoring brief, round 6 – Results and recommendations March 2023 

Analysis in English on Zimbabwe about Agriculture, Food and Nutrition and Drought; published on 10 Mar 2023 by FAO

Source: Zimbabwe: DIEM – Data in Emergencies Monitoring brief, round 6 – Results and recommendations March 2023 – Zimbabwe | ReliefWeb

Key highlights

  • The survey was conducted during the beginning of the lean season period (November through December). Planting has begun, as this period was also the start of rainy season.
  • The food security situation in Zimbabwe requires further intervention despite the majority of households consuming diets of a wide variety and more than 40 percent of those surveyed recording a high Household Dietary Diversity Score (HDDS).
  • The proportion of households facing recent food insecurity (RFI) according to the Food Insecurity Experience Scale (FIES) was approximately 5 percent. This was similar to the proportion of households facing severe hunger according to the household hunger scale. Those engaging in emergency livelihoods coping strategies such as begging (7 percent) and selling of their last female animals (27 percent) signal a lack of coping capacity – primarily in Masvingo, Midlands,
    Manicaland and Mashonaland West provinces.
  • Income drops were reported in all provinces for approximately half of survey respondents. In Mashonaland West province, over 60 percent of households reported an income drop.
  • Important to this round was assessing crop area planted in comparison to normal. The findings show that while the majority of respondents planted the same area or more, 30 percent of surveyed households planted less area than in a typical year. The Midlands and Mashonaland provinces reported that this drop in area planted was mainly attributed to crop production challenges elaborated in this report.
  • Livestock production difficulties included diseases and deaths caused mainly by the lack of access to veterinary services.

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